Things Most Precious
by signelchan
Summary: Fortune tellers, especially free ones, have no idea what they're talking about. So what if an old lady makes some predictions based on some dark energies and how they mesh together? Gundham knows not to take any stock in the nonsense, but convincing Sonia to believe him over her won't be easy, not when he usually can't talk sense into her about everything else in life.
1. Chapter 1

The coastal town was busy with all of the people who had gathered there for the carnival on the beach, but after being among the rides and sideshow attractions all day Sonia had chosen to step away and find somewhere a little less crowded to relax. She enjoyed getting to go on the different rides, and some of the tents that had popped up for the event had contained somewhat interesting things to look at, but as the afternoon dragged into evening she was looking for something a little less mainstream and a lot more peaceful. What she found was one of the streets in the town, completely empty of other people but full of vibrant storefronts that were screaming her name to enter them, and she couldn't resist that call.

There was a candy shop, several boutiques, and even a tiny toy store that she was surprised wasn't being overrun with children; without fail Sonia entered every one, enamored with the goods they offered and unable to make it out without buying at least one thing, putting a smile on the face of each shop's owner with her bubbly personality and lack of reservation when it came to spending money. After exiting the third boutique she'd entered, tucking her extra money back into her purse, she found herself standing across the still-empty street from a run-down façade on a building, an eyesore compared to everything surrounding it. The window on the door held a sign saying that it was a fortune teller's shop, and that they were doing free readings that day, and that day only.

Sonia didn't need to think twice about going into the shop, if she wasn't going to be spending money in there she couldn't possibly add to her collection of bags she was already toting around, and she ran across the street to go inside without hesitation. The interior was just as dim and drab as the façade had been, and she found herself squinting in the nearly-dark building as she looked to see where the fortune teller was located. "Oh, a visitor," a rough voice said, making Sonia jump backwards in surprise at the suddenness of the sound. "Not just a visitor, I can tell, but someone looking to learn her fortune."

"Y-yes, if that would not be too much trouble, I would be interested in learning my free fortune!" Sonia replied, still looking around as her heart continued to race from that shock she'd experienced. "If you could just turn on some lights, or maybe tell me where you are, I would greatly appreciate that."

"Right, right, not everyone is as fond of the dark as a batty old woman such as myself." With the sound of a clap, candles in the room lit up at once, and Sonia found herself in awe at the magic of the illumination of the room—until she noticed that all of the candles were fake, battery-operated, and clearly hooked up to a sound-based sensor. At a table in the center of the room, which she had no idea how she'd missed, sat a wrinkled woman with wiry hair pulled up into a tight bun, her eyes pressed closed and a mostly-toothless smile on her face. As she held out a hand in Sonia's direction, she told her, "Come to me, my dear, and let me process what the spirits have in store for you."

"Oh, I…let me just drop these right here and I can do that." Pushing her bags off of her arms and onto the floor, Sonia nearly ran to the chair at the table across from the woman's, holding her own hand out to meet the woman's in the air. Immediately it was grabbed and flipped, so that her palm was facing upward, and the woman began tracing the lines in her palm, muttering things to herself about what she was feeling.

Over the course of the following hour, the woman went through every stereotypical fortune teller activity in the book, going from the palm reading to a crystal ball, to tarot cards, and even to "speaking with the spirits". Sonia was going along with everything, enjoying how it was relatively peaceful to be sitting in there, even if she was being told that horrible things were going to happen to her and her family in the near future. She didn't say a word other than when the woman prompted her to, not wanting to break the illusions or scare the ghosts off or anything like that, and with everything that she heard she found herself more interested in learning about the process as to where the woman was getting these things.

As it seemed things were beginning to wrap up, the door to the shop came flying open, and heavy panting and matching footsteps entered the shop. "I have been searching high and low for you, with the Devas helping as much as they can given the amount of places you could have disappeared to," she heard Gundham saying there in the doorway, him being the one responsible for the tired breathing that now filled the air. "Next time you decide you're going to explore, please do everyone a favor and let us know first!"

"A dark energy enters the building," the woman grumbled, taking hold of Sonia's hand once more and continuing on with her reading. "The darkest of auras, in fact. One that spells great adventure and excitement in your life, my dear. I can sense it within you, and within that aura, that big things are meant to happen to you in due time. A ceremony, full of flowers. A tragedy, full of suffering. And two joys, full of new beginnings."

"What is she going on about?" Gundham asked, collecting himself and coming closer to where they were. "What kind of nonsense have you gotten yourself wrapped up in the second you decided to go off on your own?"

"It is a fortune teller giving me a reading," she answered, not daring to look behind her at Gundham when there was a serious expression on the woman's face that was deepening as she kept hold of the delicate hand. "The door said it was free so I gave it a try."

He looked over at the woman and how she was concentrating heavily on whatever she was thinking about, before shaking his head. "That's no reason to interfere with such demonic and dastardly magic without consulting with me first. She's most likely cursed you with something and I'm not proficient enough in spell-breaking to rid you of it."

"It is no curse!" the woman bellowed, her voice still rough but now almost ear-splittingly loud as she rose from her seat, not even clearing Sonia's head while standing. "Ceremony, tragedy, two joys. I sense great energy rising from you both, intertwining in my mind. A strong feminine energy first, but a stronger masculine one second. Come back three years from today to prove my prediction wrong, if you can bare to show your faces around my shop again."

At once, both of them repeated the amount of time that she'd requested for them to wait, but they were silenced with a hiss that showed them that she was not willing to take questions. Without even thanking the woman for her time, Sonia pulled her hand away, jumped out of her seat to grab her things, and ran for the door, Gundham right behind her. "As I said, she has most likely cursed you, and based on her behavior there at the end I wouldn't be surprised if her curse affects me as well. A Tanaka, cursed by some sham woman in a seaside town looking for monetary gain," he muttered, checking the folds of his scarf to see if his hamster companions were all accounted for. When he found all four of them, he looked at Sonia and saw her hanging her head, her shoes scuffing the ground as she walked. "Do not blame yourself for falling victim to her wiles, it happens to everyone who enters her shop, I'm certain."

"How can you say that when you came out without having her read your future? Are you just telling lies to make me feel better?" She sniffled, only for Gundham to reach out towards her, grabbing her shoulder and trying to pull her around to look at him. As she raised her head, she saw him beginning to hide his face behind his scarf, several furry heads poking out of it to assist with the task. "Come on, tell me the truth."

"I think that there's a high probability that we are both marred by her words, which means that we must work hard to prove them incorrect! We shall do so, and then return to see her in exactly three years to show how wrong she was!" His face was lighting up behind his scarf, and Sonia couldn't help but smile at both the sight and his insistence that things were going to be fine. "There's that brilliant smile upon those lips, one that this Supreme Overlord of Ice will always allow to pierce his heart."

Giggling, Sonia came in closer to him, and right as they were about to fall into a proper embrace, a shadow popped up over them, masking them both in darkness for a second before hands were prying them apart. "What do the two of you think you're doing out in public like this, getting all kissy-faced?" Kazuichi snapped, his hands not doing much to separate the two, but certainly annoying them both with his touch. "I thought we were havin' a fun day at the carnival, not the two of you havin' a date night here in town!"

"We never invited you to be here with us in the first place, you chose to crash our day together on your own terms." Looking at where Kazuichi had touched him with disdain, Gundham tried not to let it ruin the moment and let his eyes drift back towards Sonia and her amused expression. "Ahem, I mean, this wasn't a date night, this was a retrieval mission. The Devas and I were searching for Sonia and just found her moments ago."

"That's not what I walked up to. I know what I was just seeing between you." Sounding absolutely disgusted, Kazuichi reached to push Gundham away from Sonia, but was met with her hands grabbing his wrists to attempt to stop him. "M-Miss Sonia? Why're you—"

"This is no way for you to be treating someone who has done nothing but be nice to you today, even though neither of us wanted you with us!" Sonia let her grip tighten as Kazuichi visibly squirmed, his face contorting wildly as he felt her hands latching onto him and pushing him backwards. "You must apologize for your behavior, right now!"

"—okay, okay, I'm sorry for acting like this, but it's not like—ouch! I mean it, I'm really sorry!" There were tears forming in the corners of Kazuichi's eyes at how hard Sonia was holding onto him, and he wanted to get her off of him sooner rather than later. "I just thought we were havin' some playful banter here, you know? A shove here, a grumble there, it's all in good fun, Miss Sonia, I promise!"

Based on how she didn't let go of him even at that so-called promise, he knew that she was not buying what he'd said, and there was going to be little to change her mind. Seeing that Kazuichi was a bit tied up with someone who was not backing down from her iron grip, Gundham took the opportunity to make their unwanted guest feel even more uncomfortable and disgusted at what he was having to witness. He didn't do much, just lean over and gently kiss Sonia's cheek, but it was enough to set Kazuichi off even more, him hollering and begging for them to not be acting as they were in front of him.

Teasing Kazuichi with their small displays of affection was one of the things they often did to have fun while he was around, and as he was often around bothering them for various reasons, they got to do it rather frequently. He'd ramped up his assault on their time from the moment they'd gotten serious about their relationship, especially since he felt like he was entitled to some of Sonia's affection given that she showed him kindness a lot more than she should have. That had always irked Gundham, but he wasn't one to tell the woman he was devoted to that she was doing things wrong, not when she'd just as often step up and tell Kazuichi off for his behavior.

Things may have changed for all of them in the time since they'd graduated from Hope's Peak Academy, but their paths had remained intertwined no matter where they'd gone, to the point that Kazuichi was in the process of opening up his own mechanic shop, with the help of Sonia's money from back home. That was why he was always around, and Sonia was helping solely to try and get Kazuichi off her back once he could sustain his own business, so that she could focus on more important things in life. Gundham had committed himself entirely to the prospect of helping out somewhere with animal welfare, and he had wound up in a somewhat well-paying position at a veterinary hospital, acting as the person in charge of any breeding duties. It was long hours, and he came home frequently with new scratches and marks from his furry patients, but when he was able to provide for himself and Sonia on his own dime, that was all he could ask for.

He may have been paying for the two of them, but when she was still paying for someone else who wasn't even part of their relationship, it came off as a bit strange. Their other friends and acquaintances that they'd known for years all asked questions about it, specifically about if Sonia maybe did feel something romantic for Kazuichi in addition to what she claimed to feel for Gundham, and easing everyone's minds was next to impossible in their current situation. That was how he came to the conclusion that something needed to be done, but telling Sonia to stop funding a shop that never seemed to be coming around was not the choice he made. In fact, aside from comments here and there about how Kazuichi didn't need to keep taking her money, he didn't talk to her at all about her choice to assist him as much as she was.

What he chose to do instead was something straight out of fairy tales, and resulted in Sonia becoming the happiest princess alive for quite some time. He set his hamsters out on a mission to assist her in getting prepared for some kind of unknown night out, and with how elaborately trained they were, there was no doubt in his mind that they'd be up to the task. All he told them was to make her look like the princess she legally was, using things already in her closet, and then he let them loose; in the time they were dolling her up and directing her in what to wear and how to do her hair and makeup, he was preparing himself for what he'd set his heart on doing for her at the end of the night.

It was a date that he took her on, taking her back to that seaside town a couple months after their adventure there with the fortune teller, and while there was no carnival on the beach to distract themselves with, there were streets upon streets of shops and restaurants to walk by. She asked a few times if he had somewhere in particular he was taking her, to which he assured her that there wasn't anywhere, and that if she was thinking they were going to visit the old woman again she was mistaken, but half of that was a complete lie. His destination was along the moonlit boardwalk, after an evening of sampling foods at several different stops and buying quite a few things they didn't need, and it was there with the ambient sound of the crashing waves that he asked for her hand in marriage, as elaborately and dramatically as he could manage.

She looked past him referring to them as a couple of darkness and accepted his proposal without any hesitation, giving him enough time to slip a modest ring onto her finger before she was pulling him to his feet to give him a large, passionate kiss, complete with one foot kicking up behind her. "I had no doubt about what you would say," he breathlessly admitted after they'd broken their kiss apart. "In my heart, I knew that you were far too enticed by my attunement to the dark gods to say anything but yes."

"I don't think it was to do with that," she replied, bringing a thumb to brush against the scar that crossed his eye, carrying it up and into his hair, touching only the lighter parts. "How I feel about you is more about who you are and less about what you say you are, if that makes sense. I like you for your looks and your heart, Gundham, not for gods or whatever you go on about."

"There will come a day where you may think differently about that, I'm afraid, but today's not that day! We shall begin preparing the ceremony joining us in an unholy union at once, complete with involvement from the Four Dark Devas of Destruction themselves!" Cackling, Gundham noticed how Sonia's face seemed to fall as he mentioned his beloved pets. "What's the matter there, my darling? Afraid to see their power in such a ceremony?"

She shook her head, an act that usually sent blonde locks flying everywhere but due to her hair being elaborately pinned up thanks to the direction of those four hamsters, nothing moved at all. "No, it is nothing about your sweet hamsters! I just remembered what the fortune teller told us, she talked about a ceremony and I…I couldn't remember what else she said about it."

"Whatever it was that she said, it's unimportant. Completely forgettable. Don't worry a second about a word that came from her lips, your time would be better suited for planning the wedding of your dreams." As he leaned in to kiss her again, there was a second where she considered pulling away to refute his claims, but she allowed herself to believe in him and what he was saying. He was better-versed in that sort of thing than she was, and if he thought it wasn't worth her time she should listen to him.

* * *

Having the goal of a wedding that would go off without a hitch and allow for both of their unique personalities to shine was difficult to achieve, but they were determined to make it happen no matter what. The biggest obstacle to the whole thing, beyond getting Sonia's family to agree to not force the wedding to be where none of their friends could afford to attend, was one Kazuichi, who was completely shattered by the fact that the woman he pined for, who was lining his pockets with shop money, had agreed to marry a guy he simply could not stand. How he hadn't seen the engagement coming from a mile away, especially given how often he was around them, they didn't know, but he was taking the development especially hard.

When it got to the point that he was on their front step, moping every moment he could about having been too slow to make any sort of move, it became time to do something to show him that he wasn't going to be able to change their lives by being so selfish. Of course, much like the initial proposal had been done somewhat because of him, the decision that was made for how to handle his behavior was also hastily done, and could have been handled much better than it was. But they were borderline desperate when they made the choice to throw open the door while he was outside, make eye contact with him, and hold each other as closely as they could while still being modest, and it worked to get him to leave them alone for at least a little bit.

He came back eventually, though, and if Kazuichi could be called anything, it would be persistent. "So when're ya going to realize that you can do better than the Tanaka chump, Miss Sonia?" he asked one day after they'd been having an otherwise cordial meeting about his shop plans. "Like, I dunno, with someone who's got real life ambitions. Someone who knows where they're going and how they're gonna get there. Someone like me."

"I am afraid that I see right through your attempt to get me to try dating you, Kazuichi, and I have to say that my answer remains the same as it always has. I am not interested in sampling your wares." Pursing her lips together, Sonia watched Kazuichi look around rapidly as he tried to figure out what it was that she meant, and when he shrugged and gave her puppy-dog eyes instead she knew that she had to put her foot down once and for all. "I will not date you, and that is the end of that! Even if something were to happen to Gundham and he could not go through with the wedding, I would not resort to being with you."

"D-don't ya think you're being a bit harsh with that?" he stammered, his hands coming up to the sides of his unruly pink hair, grabbing it and tugging at it in desperation. "I'm a nice guy, I really am, and I'd do a lot better for ya than he ever will! Hell, I'd _do ya_ a lot better than he ever will, that's a promise!"

"I must ask you to stop, unless you would rather I stop giving you the money you need. One of us has to stop right now." He was still grabbing his hair, making himself look freakish as he almost screeched in despair at her words, but she was not going to let him convince her to back down. "Stop it, your behavior is not doing anything to make me change my mind!"

Lowering his hands slowly, Kazuichi looked panicked as he tried to meet Sonia's eyes, finding her completely looking past his glances. "C'mon Miss Sonia, you know that I can't do this mechanic thing without your money here and there, you can't just start tellin' me you're going to stop giving me it! What have I done to deserve that?"

"I think you know what you did to deserve it. You cannot treat me like I am a piece of savory meat and expect me to allow that behavior!" Sonia's hands were starting to curl into fists, as she was allowing herself to work through her anger at how Kazuichi always acted towards her, especially about her relationship with Gundham. "I have found someone who appreciates me in ways that you do not, and you must respect that. Otherwise, the money stays with me, and we could always use more money to make it rain."

Kazuichi sputtered for a moment before pulling his beanie down over his eyes, slumping his whole body forward until he was nearly doubling over. "I get it, I'm just a waste of your time and money, none of this is going anywhere anymore is it? All my dreams, out the window, and all because I know you could do better with me than with ol' Gundham."

"Go home, Kazuichi. I cannot handle being in your presence anymore," Sonia said, her voice sounding confident in her assertion. "Do not show your tail around here again until you have learned your lesson."

She didn't explicitly state what lesson he needed to learn, but he knew within himself what it was she was referring to. That got him off their backs for a few weeks, time spent starting to plan what they were going to do about their engagement—naturally they were preparing for it to end in a happy and successful marriage, but there were so many aspects to achieving that to keep in mind. It was in discussing those aspects that little issues kept cropping up, specifically ones relating to Sonia's family and how they wanted the wedding to take place in Novoselic, where they could supervise everything. She was strongly against it, as was Gundham, and that argument became more grating than fighting with Kazuichi ever got to be, even at its worst.

But the difference between them begging to be able to have their wedding where their friends could attend it, and dealing with Kazuichi and his jealous, clingy behavior was that her parents eventually saw the light and let their daughter get her way. They agreed to come out to the wedding, rather than make her hold it in their royal court, and that was the end of the fight. When Kazuichi decided that he was done being upset over getting told he wasn't good enough and that Gundham was better than him, he was once again back to being as obnoxious as he had been before, complete with his need for the last bits of money to open his shop and get it completely running.

By the time he was back to begging for money, though, there were more developments on the wedding planning front that he'd missed out on, and the _second_ he found out that the entire wedding party had been decided without him being asked a thing, he was complaining about it. "Why would either of us want to approach you with that topic?" Gundham asked when he heard Kazuichi kicking up a fuss about being left out. "If it wouldn't be seen as disrespectful to invite everyone else we went to school with and exclude you, you can guarantee that you would be nowhere near the event."

"It was my idea to let you remain on the guest list," Sonia chimed in, showing that she was still able to be kind to Kazuichi even after telling him how she really felt about him. "I do not think it is a very popular idea, but it felt right to me in my heart to do it. You can save your thanks for after the wedding."

"No I'll…just thank ya now, I suppose. Real kind of ya to keep me on the list even though someone—" he shot dagger eyes towards Gundham, who scoffed at the gesture, before going back to looking at Sonia with a much more relaxed expression, "—would rather me die than be there. You're real kind to me, Miss Sonia, all the time."

"Please refrain from looking at me so longingly, I must remind you that I am engaged to be married to the man presently with us."

To coincide with Sonia's words, Gundham cracked his bandaged knuckles on one hand, trying to look as menacing as he could with hamsters actively crawling across his scarf around his neck. "I'm not going to be as generous with the kindness as she is, so do as she says or I will go above her and scratch your name from the ledger."

"Okay, okay, I'll give it up, you don't gotta be so threatening!" Gulping, Kazuichi began looking up at the ceiling, as opposed to directly at either of the others present. "But since I'm gonna be goin' to the wedding, you've got a place for me up at the front with you both, yeah? Maybe doin' the job of reading the stuff, or perhaps holdin' the rings? I can do either of those things with some practice."

"I think you have missed the point of what was said," Sonia told him, speaking up before Gundham could say something elaborately and with the intention of riling Kazuichi up once again. "We are inviting you out of being appropriate, we do not have room for you to fill any positions in the ceremony. Please do not be offended that we have chosen others over you, they just…are better than you are."

"Excellently stated, my love. Now take her words to heart, Kazuichi, as we are not going to discuss this further with you." To show the seriousness of what he said, Gundham took that moment to grab Sonia and lightly kiss her a few times, once on her hand, once on her forehead, and twice on her cheeks, all of which were met with Kazuichi squealing in agony at having to watch their display of affection. He was basically begging for the kissing to be finished before it was over, a power that Gundham enjoyed having in that moment, but he knew that it could result in issues in the near future, especially if this man was planning on actually attending the wedding he was invited to for some reason.

Kazuichi may have been the thorn in their side when it came to the wedding, but his negative reaction to the news was the only one that was anything but incredibly happy. When they approached Mahiru for being the photographer for the event, she was beyond ecstatic to be thought of for such a big occasion. "This is _technically_ a royal wedding, since Sonia's a princess," she mused, stroking her chin in thought, "and future employers would eat that kind of thing right up if I had it in my portfolio."

"There will be much more royalty than just me present for you to photograph." Seeing the way that Mahiru's eyes lit up at that fact was enough to make Sonia smile as well. "My family will be in attendance, and as I am sure you can guess they are also royalty. If taking pictures of them will benefit you, and taking pictures of us will benefit us, is there any way this will go any way but swimmingly?"

"If you're fine with me using your wedding pictures for my own job search, then I think it can only go well for all of us!" Mahiru was still stroking her chin, but the excitement in her eyes made it clear that she was already thinking about how she was going to get the best pictures imaginable. She was just as excited to be part of the wedding as the to-be bride and groom both were, and they were happy that she didn't even seem to bring up money and getting paid for her work until late into the planning process (because by then they knew how much money they had to offer her, and it was way more than she would have gotten for any other photography job that night).

Some of their other friends were just as eager to be included as Mahiru was, even though their inclusion wasn't quite as important as hers. Teruteru was beyond thrilled to be able to cater the event, whipping up several potential menus to use over the course of the invitation conversation. Hiyoko liked that she was asked to help with some basic dancing skills before the day of the wedding, and being given the secondary task of leading all the guests in different traditional dances was enough to make her look genuinely thankful for being asked to do anything in the first place. And then there was Nekomaru, who looked like he thought he was being interrogated until he heard the word _wedding_ come up the first time, then he was yelling and celebrating more than the couple themselves were. He wasn't even being asked to be the best man in the ceremony, just one of the groomsmen, but he was happy to be included in any way.

As they all came to terms with what they were being asked to do, and the rest of the invitations (both verbal and through the mail) were given, it became clear that it wasn't just Kazuichi that wasn't being given a special task to do. That wasn't obvious to him, in his self-centric thinking, and despite everything he continued griping to Sonia about how he wished he could have something more to do because of how close he was to the two of them—a fact she was more than happy to remind him he had made up on his own. "We are not close at all," she said, him going slack-jawed at what he was hearing, "and I wish you would stop pretending that we are. Our closeness is like cats and dogs, not close at all."

"I'd like it better if you weren't givin' me an animal example as you're rejecting me again," he grumbled, picking his jaw up with his hand as if he'd really unhinged it in the shock at how she'd actually told him off. "I'm not sure why you're gonna keep treatin' me like this, I mean, I'm a good guy, right? I deserve to get to do somethin' like everyone else!"

"Wherever you got the idea that everyone else has something to do, you should tell it that it is very, very incorrect! It is only a few people who have special jobs at the wedding, I can promise you that." Smiling, Sonia hoped that he would accept her words as the truth that they were and move past it once and for all, but this was Kazuichi she was dealing with and he was never going to make things easy for her. He continued grumbling and complaining over the next several times they were together, despite her trying to get him to see that he was wrong over and over, and it quickly escalated to the point that she felt she couldn't do things on her own.

Dragging Gundham in to interact with one of his least-favorite people was a big task, but the second she made it clear that it was a last resort, he came in ready to pick a fight. "How dare you not take Sonia's word as truth, when she could spend her time doing much more productive things than spinning you a web of lies!" he bellowed when he saw Kazuichi entering their home on his next visit, spooking the guest into nearly turning around and not coming back. Once again, though, it _was_ Kazuichi they were dealing with, and he didn't know how to admit defeat and get over things.

"What're ya gonna do about me knowing that you're just trying to, y'know, save face with me while I'm here so that I don't suspect that you're both lyin' to me?" Kazuichi asked, realizing that leaving was not going to do him any favors in the reality he'd painted for himself. "I just want to be part of things like everyone else, and you're not givin' me that much. What kind of friend does that, huh?"

"I'm not your friend," Gundham coldly replied, raising a hand dramatically in front of him to try and strike a terrifying pose. "In fact, I am the Supreme Overlord of Ice who shall never be questioned in such an insulting manner! Whoever told you that 'everyone else' has a role in our upcoming wedding was sorely mistaken, and if I hear even one more word from you about wanting something that you do not deserve, the Devas and I will find great joy in bringing harm to you in any way possible!"

Flinching at the thought of being hurt by a man and his four hamsters, Kazuichi shook his head rapidly to show that he was not interested in such a fate. "I get it, I've gotta just suck it up and get over the fact that you don't wanna include me, but Miss Sonia—"

"I have no interest in including you."

"—okay, whatever, I get it. I'm just a waste of your time and you'd rather not invite me than let me be there and do what you're letting all the others do. I'll get outta your hair over this now, I really will." Kazuichi may have been saying that, but he certainly didn't mean it, and the couple knew that the argument would keep happening again and again until the wedding was an afterthought to all of them. That was exactly what happened, and in the last weeks before they were married they were having to push Kazuichi out almost daily because he would keep coming back, begging to be given a role in the wedding.

As not everyone actually had a role, which he learned and finally almost immediately after showing up at the ornate church where the ceremony was being held, he never mentioned his desire to be given the same treatment as all others again. There wasn't even an apology for all of the obnoxious behavior he'd had beforehand, but one wasn't expected and certainly wasn't going to be demanded. After all, Kazuichi showed up to the wedding and didn't blurt out that he objected to the lawful union between Gundham and Sonia when he was given the chance to do so, and for that they could forgive all behaviors he'd put them through. He let them have their day in the heavily-decorated church, where the flowers greatly outnumbered the people present, where all of their friends and family put aside any cultural differences to have a good time. There was nothing more they could ask for from him, on such an important day in their lives.

That didn't exactly translate to after the wedding was long over and they'd started to settle into their married life, because their greatest wish with him was for him to stop showing up at their house at random hours, expecting to be allowed to come inside and have long conversations about money and his shop. That was the one thing that they begged and pleaded with him to stop, just because they knew that they could always talk about that at some more convenient time for everyone involved, not just him. With a smirk he'd remind them that nighttime was best for him, because he was running a fledgling mechanic shop and didn't have time during the day to step out and talk to them, and was there really anything else they could be doing at night that was more important than talk with him?

With shifting eyes and blushing faces they'd both have to say that there wasn't anything besides sleep, and that was how they knew that Kazuichi was only doing this to them to keep them from doing anything he didn't approve of. "One of these days we should not even open the door for him," Sonia remarked after they'd finally gotten him to leave at some late, after-midnight hour. "It would mean the sound of his knocking all night, but it would also mean not having to talk to him."

"If you believe that we could get anything done with that racket as background noise, you are sorely mistaken," Gundham replied with a yawn, completely exhausted due to his work life and the late hour. "It's better to at least put a stop to his banging and suffer with his presence, than have to listen to the banging all night. He is, obviously, quite persistent."

Blinking back sleep as she stood, Sonia gently latched herself onto one of Gundham's arms, laying her head on his shoulder. "But if we ignored him, there would be more banging than just his, correct? I think that would be quite an acceptable trade."

He was unable to answer her as he was gasping for words to even say in response, his tired mind unprepared for that sort of question to have been asked. Instead, he led her back to their room, where they both promptly fell asleep when finally, properly in their spots in the spacious bed.

* * *

Once things with that stupid mechanic shop began settling down, and it was finally turning a profit that meant that Kazuichi wasn't begging for more money to keep it running, he began to leave the couple alone a lot more than he had been. He was still showing up unannounced at their front door several times a week, almost always in the evening when they were least excited to see him, but it wasn't a near-nightly occurrence like it had once been, and they were beyond thankful for everything that had fallen into place to give them that peace. They'd been able to use their nights without his intrusion very well, staying up past their designated bedtime weaving stories and intertwining bodies as often as they pleased, and they were both more at peace with him showing up when it meant that they'd get their alone time together the following night or two.

Then came the string of nights where he didn't show up at all, and the only communication they had with him came in the form of messages he was sending through common friends that he had with the couple. Some days it was Hiyoko or Akane calling Sonia, clearly against their will, to pass along that Kazuichi was still somewhat creepy about her and that he was planning on giving her some of her money back soon enough; other days it was one of a multitude of people just happening to stop by the veterinary clinic to talk to Gundham about something they'd been told by Kazuichi. Neither of them were exactly thrilled to be having to talk to him through middlemen, as it meant that there was possibly more to the situation that was being left out, but not seeing him was a very nice change of pace.

That string suddenly broke in the worst way, with him coming over in the middle of the day begging for Sonia to help him out, because he'd gotten in over his head and the money he'd made was gone and he didn't know what to do except turn to her. Sonia may not have wanted to be roped into Kazuichi's affairs more than she'd already been, but if there was one thing she couldn't stand seeing it was him looking like he was about to cry there at her front door, so she went against her better judgment and went back with him to his shop to see what could be salvaged. What she found there was not an unfixable mess like he'd described, but rather a completely cleaned building that looked like he'd been doing some repairs to the facility rather than just people's cars and machines.

"When did this get to be so sparkling?" she asked him as he led her through the building, into the main office that was organized with file cabinets and a real desk, before taking her into the waiting area that was completely empty, minus a few chairs in one of the corners. "I must say, this is more impressive than I thought you could make it. It is almost like a dirty pig isn't the one running it after all!"

"Yeah, uh, that'd be 'cause it's me runnin' this place, not someone without any class or sense about them. I know how to make somewhere look nice, especially to impress the lady who helped me get this far." Kazuichi was beginning to blush as he spoke, his hat coming down over his eyes thanks to his hand that was firmly placed on the top of his head. "I just wanted to show ya this as a thank you for all your help, Miss Sonia. Couldn't have done this without ya bein' there for me."

"You are very welcome," she replied, her eyes wandering around that empty space and her mind beginning to drift into things she could do with such a place. "Say, Kazuichi, do you ever have many people here at once?"

He shrugged, his hat obscuring his view of what she was doing. "A couple people here and there, never enough to fill all the chairs. Why d'ya ask, huh?"

"I was just curious. This space would make for a lovely storefront, to help drive business here at your shop. Clothing, perhaps? I could always import goods from Novoselic and sell them to those who never have had the chance to visit, that could drum up business and make extra money that could be spent on further improvements!" Clasping her hands together, Sonia did a tiny bounce as she turned to face Kazuichi, as he was pulling his hat back up to where it normally rested. "Wouldn't that be the bee's elbows, if it worked out?"

"I wouldn't be complainin' about extra money, or more time spent with ya," he replied, that blush becoming deeper on his cheeks. "It's up to you, though. And that man you married, if you're even gonna let him in on this plan of yours."

Mentioning how she'd have to talk to Gundham about the idea of opening a shop in the building she'd technically bought for Kazuichi (he'd picked the location and made the purchase, but she'd supplied the money for it) brought the wind out of Sonia's sails a bit, but nevertheless she persisted with her eagerness to succeed. "He will understand that this is what will make me happy, and as long as I am happy then he will be too! It is how things should work in a marriage, after all."

Her optimism was blinding, almost to the point of blocking out the fact that she was dealing with someone who absolutely did not see eye-to-eye with her husband, and until she got home she was convincing herself that everything was going to work in her favor. That changed when she approached Gundham with the idea—he was immediately skeptical when she started talking about opening her own shop for Novoselic fashions, and when she mentioned where it would be operated out of he immediately put his foot down. "Nonsense! There is no room for you to be working alongside such lowlife as Kazuichi, not when you are both a princess _and_ the wife of the Supreme Overlord of Ice. You must change these plans at once if you want to truly create a place of your own."

"I should have expected you to say that, but I promise that working there would be perfectly fine! You must trust me on this, Gundham, it will work exactly as I want it to!" She wasn't desperate enough to start begging him to let her do her own thing, as she understood that he was being apprehensive with good reason, but right then all she wanted was to give this silly dream a shot. "I was the one who paid for the building in the first place, I should get to make use of it too."

Shaking his head, Gundham didn't continue shooting her idea down, but he did tell her to put it in the back of her mind and really think on it for a while before she chose to do anything with it. That was the cue that meant that they had other plans for the evening, which resulted in them going out for a lovely date night followed by constructing new parts of the sprawling cages that his hamsters lived in once they got back to the house, and the activity was enough to get Sonia to mostly forget about what she'd decided she wanted to do. It was a thought that drifted back into her mind off and on over the following weeks, but she never let it get as strong as it had been while she was standing in that empty part of the shop.

That changed one night when Kazuichi, predictably, was at their front door, his hand banging on it relentlessly as he demanded entry. He was earlier than his usual arrival time, showing up just after dinnertime, when the couple was together in the room with the hamsters while Gundham was carefully hand-feeding them, like he did whenever he had the chance. Sonia went to go see who was at their door, and when she came back minutes later with Kazuichi still in his greasy work clothes behind her, it was clear that something wasn't quite right. "Just the people I've gotta talk to," he said as the occupants of the house locked eyes with each other, Gundham's dual-colored ones narrowed as Sonia's looked apathetic to whatever cause she'd heard to bring Kazuichi into their home. "It's goin' horribly, lemme tell ya that much, okay? I don't know what to do anymore!"

"You can start by leaving and returning in less dirty attire, your grease stains never come out of the carpeting and it would be fatal to the Devas if they were to stumble into any of it." If it had been Sonia to speak first, perhaps the reaction would have been much gentler, but Gundham was not pleased to see freshly-dirtied Kazuichi in his house (he wasn't fond of Kazuichi ever being there, but this was more of a disdain than usual). "Change, and quickly, before you touch anything."

"And where am I supposed to get something to change into from, my car? That's implyin' I've even got one right now, which I don't!" To try and alleviate the problem he'd caused by walking in while wearing work clothes, Kazuichi began to unzip the front of his jumpsuit, but all that did was make Gundham snap at him to take care of that elsewhere, not in the presence of himself or Sonia. "Ugh, what are you expectin' me to do? I've gotta get out of this, but it's not like I've got somethin' on under it, so it's either me strippin' to my boxers or I'm stuck wearin' this."

Looking past the fact that this man had just considered being indecent in someone else's house without a second thought, Gundham knew that him sitting there, wasting time arguing back and forth was only going to lead to more of a mess to clean up. "Head into the bathroom, I'll get you something to change into. Once you're clean we can discuss what brought you here in this state." He made sure that Kazuichi did, in fact, head to where he'd been directed before he left the room himself, telling Sonia to stay right where she was and not to follow him.

He went to their bedroom and grabbed the first unworn pair of pajama pants he found in his closet, and to pair with it he took a holey shirt that the Devas had clearly chewed to their hearts' content. If Kazuichi was to complain about either article, then he was just being ungrateful for what he was being given, and with that in mind Gundham went to where he'd told the other man to go and knocked twice on the door. Instead of the door opening, he was treated to being told, "Look, I'm not sure if you're guessin' why I'm here or not yet but—"

"Right now, I don't care why you're here," he cut in, putting a stop to whatever Kazuichi was trying to do. "Open the door and put some clothes on so we can wash that grimy suit of yours and discuss this like…adults." The door came open, and before Gundham could pass the clean clothes through it, the jumpsuit was being pushed at him, and that made the exchange much quicker than expected.

"—I wasn't gonna ask for you to wash it, but thanks there, pal! I'll be out in a sec, you're treatin' me so much better than I thought you would!" Kazuichi seemed pleased as he closed the door on himself to get re-dressed, while Gundham quickly made his way to the closest sink he could think of, choosing the one in the kitchen over all others. At least there he could enlist the assistance of dish soap to try and get out some of the grease that was clinging deeply to the fabric in his hands.

Losing track of time while he worked, Gundham only remembered that he'd been in the middle of feeding his pets when he heard Sonia scream from the room where their sprawling cage was located. He was soaked up to his elbows in soapy water, but he dropped the jumpsuit into the filled sink basin and ran to see what had caused his wife distress. "What is going on in here?" he loudly asked as he stormed into the room, finding Sonia backed against the wall with all four Devas climbing on her, every single one of them looking at Kazuichi as he was trying to fix part of the tubing for the cage. "How did that—what did you—explain what is happening in here right this instant!"

"He was trying to feed the hamsters, and one of them bit him and he fell into the cage," Sonia replied, stroking one of the animals that was resting in the crook of her arm. "It was only an accident, Gundham, there is no need to be so angry about it."

"Angry? Me? This is not angry, this is me being concerned for the well-being of the Four Dark Devas of Destruction!" He had already accounted for them several times, each time he looked at Sonia another chance to count how many furry creatures she had on her, but he was constantly going back to looking at Kazuichi, at how he was trying to rebuild what he'd broken and failing to do it correctly. "Step aside, lowlife, and let me handle this!"

"Whoa there, why're ya callin' me a lowlife? All I did was stumble because one of your beasts bit me," Kazuichi snapped, waving a piece of tubing that had broken off in his hand at Gundham. "Besides, before ya start thinkin' about building it all back together, when I stumbled I think I threw the knife you were usin' to cut up their carrots. Think it landed in part of the cage."

"The knife? And you could have hit one of them with it?" The fear of losing one of his hamsters without him being present for its demise was something that Gundham never wanted struck into his heart, and yet there it was, on full display for the others in the room. He now knew that he needed to get the knife out of wherever it had landed before any of the Devas got to return to their cage, and that needed to be done before any further repairs were made. "Okay, I have a plan to return everything to its proper state. Where exactly did you see the knife fall?"

Kazuichi motioned his head towards a heavily-tubed part of the cage, where there were multiple open ends due to the initial accident. "Somewhere in there, wasn't quite sure which one it was. All I know is that I knocked the rest of this down, and I've gotta fix it for ya before ya blow your top."

"I thought you were going to say 'blow your load'," Sonia chimed in, doing nothing to help the heated situation between the two men. "That would be quite vulgar for this particular moment though, so I understand why you chose not to."

Gundham was ignoring her, shaking his hands off to have them as dry as possible as he began searching the opened tubes for the sharp blade he used to give his hamsters only the finest cut carrots for their nightly snack. As he was looking, Kazuichi was initially working on reconnecting other pieces of the cage he'd broken apart, but soon he found himself watching what Gundham was doing intently. At the very moment that Gundham's head perked up, having spotted the shine of the blade deep down in one of the tubes, the handle caught on the curved part below it, an idea formed in Kazuichi's mind that was his way of trying to be helpful. "Hey, if you've found it, why don't ya just take off all the parts of the cage above it so you're not windin' your arm down through so much tube?" he suggested.

"I would rather not have to do more work to reconnect this, thank you," Gundham replied, taking off exactly one extra piece of the cage before slowly sticking his hand down into the wide tube, waiting to feel the blade between his fingers before he carefully attempted to grab it. Unfortunately for him, as he was about elbow-deep in the tube, Kazuichi dropped the piece he was working on above them, allowing for it to fall right onto the back of Gundham's head. It wasn't a hard impact, but unexpected enough with him already being on his toes that he lost his balance and fell forward.

What he noticed next was that his wrist was stiff and that the tube now reached to the middle of his upper arm. "Gundham, are you okay?" Sonia asked, all four Devas squeaking along with her. "That looked like your arm slid down rather deep, did you find the knife?"

He tried pulling his arm out of the tube but found himself unable to do so, and the stiffness in his wrist turned to a stinging sensation that made him slightly panic. "I believe I did," he replied, turning to look back at Kazuichi and how he had both hands covering his mouth in shock at what he'd seen. "What, do you have something to say about what you just did? I know you're responsible for my handmade cage falling to pieces and crashing into me."

"Yeah, uh, lemme just…help pop that part of the cage off. Me and Miss Sonia can fix the rest of this, but I don't think you're gonna exactly like what I saw happen." Kazuichi took control for a moment, doing exactly as he said and freeing the part of the cage that Gundham's arm was stuck in from the rest of the tubing. The moment the seal was broken, the unmistakable sight of blood dripping from the part his arm was in filled their vision, and Gundham was left unable to say a word as he realized that he'd managed to pierce his wrist with the knife he'd been trying to get, all because he'd fallen forward from a light impact.

The speechlessness wore off within minutes, but by that time he was already being taken over to the closest hospital, so that he could be helped out of his current predicament and stitched up if needed. By the time Sonia had managed to drive him over, the blood had stopped running, which was a good sign that he hadn't injured himself too severely, but it was still necessary to have someone take the knife out for him. "I would stay here with you, but I cannot leave Kazuichi at the house by himself for too long," Sonia explained, after she'd stopped at the curb to let her husband out of the vehicle. "He will be escorted home as soon as he has assisted me with cleaning up the mess he made. I am not letting him treat us like the doormats he thinks we are!"

"Oddly assertive, but please do come back when you are finished. I would hate to be stranded here all night without you." He blew her a kiss as he closed the door so she could drive off, and into the building he went. The night was quite busy there in the emergency room, and because his arm wasn't actively making a mess he told to sit down and wait until he was called back after checking in. There were a few seats open against the wall, away from the coughing, vomiting messes elsewhere in the waiting room, and he took the one directly in the middle, leaving one open on each side. People came and went, visitors and patients alike, but he paid no mind to any of them, focusing only on thinking about what had happened to land him in that very place at that moment. He'd been so wrapped up in fixing what had gone wrong for his hamsters that he'd forgotten that Kazuichi had been present for his own issues, and now those were clearly a thing of the past.

It was at about the time that he was considering going up to the desk to see how much longer he'd be needing to wait that a couple approached him, a sick and clearly pregnant woman taking one of the seats next to his, while the man she was with stood in front of her, as if he was waiting for something. Quickly Gundham realized that what the man was waiting for was a place to sit right next to her, and he made an offer: "Would you care for this spot, sir? I could move to allow you to be next to your companion, if you desire." The man seemed surprised to hear the offer and accepted it, and when Gundham stood to move to the other empty seat he realized that a clump of hamster fur from his clothing had been left behind where he'd been seated before, but the other man didn't pay it any attention.

"Thank you for that, it means a lot," the man said, his voice tired and showing the strain of being caretaker of someone so sickly like the woman next to him. "If you don't mind me asking, what happened to you? That doesn't look like something that warrants a visit to the hospital." Right then Gundham made the decision to embellish what had happened a bit, to paint the situation less like an accident and more like an intentional attack on him, and from there conversation naturally flourished between himself and the couple.

Of course, in true Gundham fashion, he was being a bit more dramatic than necessary to lighten the mood, but he felt that they needed it. And when it came time for him to finally go back to see someone about the knife and the tube, he made sure to give them one last thing to smile about before he was out of their lives. "I shall take my leave," he said to them with a bow, continuing with wishing them the best for what felt like the tenth time during their talk, and following it with, "Let's hope that the next time your paths cross with that of Gundham Tanaka, it is under better circumstances."

It wasn't until he was back in an exam room that he realized he hadn't gotten their names and that there was a chance he'd never remember them if he did see them again. He was hopeful that he'd see them before he left, but he was in and out rather quickly once a nurse actually came in to see him, the removal of the equipment and stitching the rather minor incision taking less than a quarter of the time he'd spent waiting for it to happen. It did mean that he was left sitting outside the hospital in the cold until Sonia was able to come pick him up, and during that time he didn't see the couple either, but they were on his mind the entire time he was waiting.

Sonia drove up much like she'd dropped him off, quickly and clearly in a hurry to get back home. "We sanitized everything and got it all back to normal, minus the cracked pieces and the one you had on your arm," she told him once they were on their way, "and I made sure that Kazuichi understood that he was never to come over like that again, no matter what his crybaby story of the night may be!"

"I do appreciate you putting your foot down like that," he replied, giving a somewhat content smile even with the late hour and his now-obvious tiredness. "However, what happened was merely an accident, and I feel it was one with a purpose beyond our understanding. I met this couple tonight while waiting to be seen, and…"

He was still telling her the story by the time they got home, and even as they were getting into bed he was talking about what kind of impact that his interaction with the couple had left on his mind. Even though she was barely able to get a word in, Sonia was happy to listen to him break down exactly what had happened and why he was so fixated on it. When he finally wrapped up, she nodded in understanding, even as her head was beginning to sink back into her pillows. "That sounds like it may have turned into something tragic if you were not there to keep them company," she decided, her eyes fluttering closed as she was already starting to drift off. "A tragedy, full of suffering as they waited to get help."

Although he knew whatever he said would most likely not be heard as she was quickly falling asleep, he couldn't leave their conversation off on those words, not when he knew where they were from. "How dare you speak the fortune teller's so-called prophecy to me in our bed," he grumbled, rolling onto his side to look at Sonia and her peaceful expression, completely unaware or ignorant of what he was scolding her for. "I forgave the ceremony with flowers part, but this, this is unacceptable. There was no truth to what she said to us, and when we can return to her dwelling next summer we will prove that to the world."

It had only been a year and a half since they'd heard what the old woman had predicted for them, and it was still a year and a half until they'd know they were free of whatever magic her words held. Gundham wanted to believe that she had spewed nothing but hot air, that her prediction was so vague it could apply to anything, but deep in his heart he had a fear that she'd been right on two points, and the third was the one he was most insistent on proving wrong.

His last thought before falling asleep was on the couple at the hospital, and how he wished he could make their chance meeting what fulfilled the prophecy, if it needed fulfillment.

* * *

**A/N: no don't ask me about why I'm writing this pair, I don't know what came over me. (actually, I do know, and I'll explain more at the end of the second half of the story.)**


	2. Chapter 2

Over the following year, it seemed that the only things that were happening were more of the same life they'd already been living. Sure, there weren't as many interruptions from Kazuichi at their home anymore, but that was less because of him actually heeding what he'd been told and more because he'd been given somewhere new to speak with them. Against her better judgment, but with the fact that she paid for the place guiding her way, Sonia had gone through with opening up a small clothing shop in the unused part of the waiting room at the mechanic shop, drumming up a lot more business for Kazuichi than he could handle most days. She felt at peace selling goods from her home country, and people were eager to buy them from her, as well as take a look at the mechanical handiwork taking place in the other part of the building.

As much as he wasn't thrilled with seeing it happen, Gundham couldn't argue against it when it meant that he wasn't being pestered at home by someone he'd rather never see again in his lifetime. He'd honestly forgotten what life was like without Kazuichi's constant appearances, and unless he heard that the man was bothering his wife while they were working, he was content with leaving his hands completely out of that situation. The two of them could be co-workers of sorts, and he could mind his own business and trust in Sonia's loyalty to him and him alone. Her happiness meant more to him than his disgust and hatred of Kazuichi ever could—after all, he loved her enough to marry her, he'd certainly hope that he preferred seeing her happy than stewing in his own negativity.

It was roughly five months before they were to return to the seaside town to prove to the fortune teller the flaws in her prediction when something changed to take their lives out of the repetitive rut they had fallen into. As all the weird things did, it started with Kazuichi being involved somehow, but it wasn't actually anything he'd done that was the catalyst for everything that followed; instead, it was the fault of a vulgar-mouthed woman who had brought some kind of motorbike for him to fix, who had decided she was going to check out Sonia's clothing shop while she waited. When she walked into the shop, the only people inside were Sonia herself and Gundham, there only because he hadn't had anything else to do on his lunch break and he wanted to see his wife, and neither of them noticed her presence until she loudly exclaimed, "Damn, if I knew I could walk into this place and watch softcore porn for free, I'd have been coming here a long time before this!"

"It was merely a gentle kiss," Sonia replied, her face heating up at the remark the woman had just made, "and it is not a typical thing to happen in here. How may I help you?"

"I don't need any help! Just get back to the touching and the kissing and I'll be right here." The woman leaned back against the door, effectively blocking anyone else from getting inside, and she put on a somewhat intense expression as she stared at the couple, both of them looking confused at the other. "Well? What are you waiting for, I'm just going to watch, no big deal, right?"

Rather that do as the woman was demanding, Gundham apologized to Sonia for what he was about to do before he went to corner the woman, her decision to block the door ending up being her downfall as she soon couldn't move to let herself out. "This is no place for that sort of behavior," he coldly said, trying to come off as intimidating and feeling like he wasn't quite able to do it wearing his vet coat and not his usual dark colors. "Either you will browse the racks like a proper customer, or you will be banned and removed from the shop. What will you choose, beast?"

He'd added the last word as a flourish, and it was what made the woman break, her expression crumbling into one that was very meek, very timid, and clearly very aroused at something. "I-I'll look around at once, but do me a favor and call me that again, please?"

"I aim to arouse no one other than my queen of darkness, therefore your request shall be denied." He felt somewhat disgusted that she'd just gotten turned on by him calling her a beast, of all things, and he backed away when he saw her start to sink lower against the door. "Please, keep this behavior out of my wife's shop, it's unnecessary."

Now that she had the space, the woman moved to reopen the door, and slunk out without actually giving a single item in the store a glance. "That was quite bizarre, do you think she meant to be in a clothing store in the first place?" Sonia asked, as she and Gundham both watched the door quickly close in the woman's wake. "She seemed quite content on seeing what we were doing, not what I am selling."

Going as far as reaching to open the door, Gundham stopped when he realized that chasing her down would most likely mean having to talk to Kazuichi about her and if he knew who she was. "Nonsense, I am sure she intended to take a look at your goods and got distracted by the demonic energies that we both radiate. There's no need to dwell on her further, we can be hopeful she chooses not to show her face around here again." They pushed past all mention of her for the rest of his break, and when he left to return to the vet's office he saw that the mechanic shop was completely empty, no sign of the strange woman anywhere.

It was unlikely that she was an illusion, but she'd been in and out of their lives so quickly that her being real didn't seem plausible. But as he found out that night, she was very real, and she'd done more to be creepy towards them without them even being present for it. The conversation the moment he got home that night and changed into his lounge clothes, complete with hamsters hiding in his pockets, was on the topic of the woman, and it was clear that something about her was now gnawing deep at Sonia's soul. "Kazuichi came in not long after you left," she started, her eyes cast upward towards the high ceiling in their bedroom rather than anywhere at her husband. "He told me it was an urgent matter, so I offered him an ear and he chose to speak at it until I had to push him away."

"Oh? What would he have to tell you that would require so much of your time? Surely it was not another failed attempt to wrestle you out of my life and into his." Chuckling, Gundham thought he'd just suggested the worst thing he could possibly hear, but what Sonia told him blew all those expectations out of the water.

She was fidgeting, the first sign that what she was saying wasn't something that she knew how to approach, and her eyes were still focused firmly above her head. "The woman in my store, he was telling me about her and what she said to him. He said that she was there to have her motorized bike repaired, because she had ridden it to the store and someone there had broken it on accident." Pausing, Sonia's eyes flickered down for just a second, at about the same time that her hands took hold on the bottom of her skirt, her thumbs rubbing circles into the fabric. "Then he said that after she saw us, she wanted to know everything about us and he told her all he could, and she was quite rude about how we would not give her a 'show' while she was there!"

There was plenty to unpack already, but Gundham was barely given a second to process any of it before Sonia was continuing on, her voice getting higher and higher with each additional thought. "I had to ask if he knew why she wanted a show, and he said that he did, and that would be because she had asked for one at the party where her bike was damaged and that had resulted in the damages. And then…and then she said that she would have preferred us to be the ones to give her a show to the people at the party, because we seem like responsible people who need our lives to be ruined! Can you believe that?"

"Lives to be ruined?" he repeated, her nodding rapidly at his understanding of what she'd said. "I'm afraid that I have no idea what she could mean by that, but—"

"Listen to me! Kazuichi told me that she explained that as well, and that what she meant is nothing I want to ever hear anyone say again!" By that point Sonia was nearly screaming, her passion about the story she was relaying to him getting the best of her, and all Gundham could do was wait until she calmed down about things to get any words in. "I told him that I never want him to let the disgusting woman back into his shop and he got offended, but it was not him she was saying nasty things about, so it would make sense that he would want to get her money again in the future!"

"—Sonia, you have not told me what she meant. I cannot make any sense of what you're telling me right now, and…" Gundham's voice trailed off as Sonia's eyes finally shot towards his, their gazes locking firmly and him being able to see the look of determination she was wearing. "I assume this may be something better explained without words?"

She did nothing except let her lips press together, her eyebrows furrowing slightly as she held her eyes in contact with his. They were there for a few moments, the only audible sounds in the room being the movement of the Devas in Gundham's pockets, and when she felt the moment was right she exhaled deeply and got to the point of the story she'd been spinning. "The woman was surprised to find that we are married, clearly in love, and childless, and she wanted to see us change that by putting on a performance for her there inside my shop. There, now you know what she meant, and now we can move on without thinking about this ever again!"

It was obvious to Gundham that there was more going on with this woman's train of thought that she hadn't expressed to anyone, but he was more concerned with how violent a reaction Sonia had given to this news. "While that is quite, er, inappropriate of her to request of total strangers, we did not receive her wish from her nor do we need to act on it," he pointed out, hoping that him being more level-headed right then would calm Sonia down. "If she comes around again, Kazuichi can inform her that her demands will not be met, and then that can be the true end of this whole situation."

That was where they left it between them, and that was where the entire topic seemed to rest for a while, but there was something about it that didn't sit right in Sonia's mind, regarding how easily her husband had brushed it off of their shoulders. A little over a week later, after days and nights where she hadn't stopped thinking about the audacity of some stranger coming into their lives with that intent, she felt she had no choice but bring it back up with him. "Gundham, why did you want to push the handling of that woman onto Kazuichi, rather than do it yourself?" she asked one morning, as they were both getting ready for their day. He nearly choked on his toothbrush at the question, and it took him several moments to collect himself to answer.

"It felt like it was more of his problem to solve than our own, seeing as we pushed the woman out of the shop and it was him she was saying those things to," he replied, the back of his throat tingling from how he'd made himself gag when he'd accidentally half-swallowed his toothbrush. "It was more of a way to get out of the conversation, if I am being honest, but you wanted out just as badly as I did."

"I know, but…" She sighed, grabbing a comb and running it through her long hair to straighten it after her night's sleep. "Something about the whole thing has stayed on my mind this whole time. The woman wanted to watch us having an intimate moment to, as Kazuichi said it, 'ruin our lives'."

"Correct, you told me this already. And by that she meant conceive a child, as you told me that she found it strange that we are childless." There was something about pointing that out that made Gundham stop to think, a fleeting idea crossing his mind that he quickly shook off, the contents of the idea disgusting to him to have even thought of. "If you are going to tell me that you are considering the child part of this, please tell me so right now."

"I may be, but only because she is right about us being responsible people, but I feel that adding a child into our lives would not ruin things, but rather enrich them!" It was the first time they'd ever approached that topic, and to do it while doing their morning routine was strange at best, but if it needed to be said, it was going to come out sooner or later.

That was when the idea crossed Gundham's mind a second time, and he felt helpless against keeping it to himself further: "I feel that it would be fitting to embark on that journey soon, if I am allowed to say so. After all, when we go back to prove the prophecy untrue, it would be fitting to show that we have experienced nothing to fulfil the final part of that fortune teller's cursed words. A single, unborn child would not be anything quite like what she said, if you remember what she told us."

It was true, they had been given the prediction of two joys entering their lives, and showing up to her front door with only a single joy would show that she was a phony at what she claimed to do, and the exact words she'd used had never once left Sonia's heart. They didn't make any decisions right then, but over the following days and weeks they discussed it further, choosing ultimately to let the fate that was to befall them be chosen by the higher powers, not themselves, but the moment they'd decided to work against the fortune the old woman had made based off of those very same powers, they'd sealed their fates one way or another, and only time would tell them how wrong they were to do so.

Time that passed rather quickly, all things considered, as their daily lives didn't slow down just because of things they were doing on the side. He was still going to his job at the veterinary office most days, and whenever he was working with animals with the intention of breeding them he'd think to himself how he'd brought up them doing the same thing for themselves, except whereas he was having to facilitate a lot of what went down between the animals, he was an equally-responsible party in whatever happened between him and Sonia. She too was keeping up with her day job, but her attention was always somewhere that wasn't the clothing she was trying to sell. Something in the back of her mind was telling her that she needed to be vigilant, to keep her eyes peeled for any sight of that strange woman again, but for what reason she wasn't completely sure.

The woman did show up there outside the store a second time about a month after her first visit, peering in through the door to look and see who was inside before she entered, looking somewhat dejected when she saw it was just Sonia there. "Where's your loverboy?" she asked as soon as the door was closed behind her and Sonia was already looking at her with disdain. "I was hoping I could run into both of you again, kill two birds with one stone, that sort of thing. Where is he?"

"He is at work, which is where I would think you should be as well," Sonia replied, her immediate reaction to having to interact with this woman once again to bring her arms defensively in towards her chest. "How about you just turn around and leave, and disappear without telling my friend outside that you think my husband and I should do romantic and personal things."

"Psh, you can't get rid of me that easy." Unlike her first visit, the woman went straight to standing in front of Sonia, placing her hands on her shoulders and standing up tall in front of her, letting her large and partially uncovered chest take up most of the limited space between them. Sonia barely had time to move her hands back out of the way before where she'd been holding them was taken up by someone else's personal bubble. "I'm stuck here again because someone broke my bike, and your little friend out there told me he'd fix it free of charge if it happened a second time. I just added the modifications, I don't know a damn thing about the way the actual bike part works." As she was talking, the woman was leaning in closer to Sonia, until their bodies were just about touching. "So I decided, hey, I'm here, I'm not doing anything, let's check on the princess and see what she's up to, see if she's in here getting her brains fucked out yet or not."

"Please stop with the vulgarities, I did nothing to ask for this from you!" In her current position Sonia felt helpless, but the second she raised her voice the woman flinched backwards, the entire way she was carrying herself changing into something less intimidating and much easier to get an upper hand on. "Before you start treating me as if I am some sort of, I don't know, sex animal for you to watch, could I at least have your name?"

"Why do you want my name?" the woman asked, as she shuffled backwards a few steps. "Are you going to use it to keep me out of here? 'Cause the mechanic out there said I'd be able to come over as much as I'd like, and I wouldn't want you to ban me."

The idea to actually forbid the woman from returning did occur to Sonia, but if Kazuichi wanted to let her come around she wasn't going to stop that. "No, certainly not! I merely want to be able to know who it is I'm talking to when you are present. Right now, you are just the weird sex lady and I am certain you would prefer a better title."

"N-no, that one's fine," the woman replied, "but if you insist, my name's Miu. Pleasure to actually meet you, now let me know all about how _you_ get pleasured."

"And now you may leave my store, Miu." With a firm hand pointing towards the door, Sonia changed her mind about not banning the woman after all. "You are no longer allowed to enter my shop, even if Kazuichi tells you that you may. His mechanic work can still be done for you, but you do not get to be in here." There was a silent moment between them, while Miu looked at where she was being directed, before her eyes gave a quick flutter and she turned around and bolted out the door. Sonia wasn't sure if that was going to be the end of seeing her around or not, but now that she knew the woman's name she felt like she had more power over her than she'd ever had before.

If she had any idea of the circumstances surrounding their future third encounter, she may have worked better to have that second one end on better terms. There was only one big difference in her life between that day and the next time Miu was having Kazuichi work on her bike (cursing up a storm about how his shoddy craftsmanship was causing her so many issues), and it was one that she wasn't quite sold on telling the world about at that moment, especially not the vulgar blonde woman and the mechanic that would never take no for an answer. But it was one that was going to be brought up sooner or later, because there was not going to be any way around it.

There were seven weeks between visits, and in that seven weeks everything had begun falling into place for the Tanakas, specifically in regards to their attempt to show the fortune teller woman how wrong she'd been with her prediction. It had initially been a bit of a shock to them both when they'd found out that their attempts to start a family had taken rather quickly, but the second that Gundham made a slightly panicked joke about how it was a no-brainer it would happen with ease, given that he had been titled the Ultimate Breeder while in school, they both knew that what they were about to go through was exactly what they needed right then. Them having a child was going to happen sooner or later, and the fact that it was going to be happening perfectly in line with when they needed it to was just icing on the cake.

That changed the moment that they got to see the little flicker of life that they were growing between them, a sight that was welcoming and heartwarming—until it was pointed out that there wasn't just one rapidly-beating heart on the screen, but rather two. A completely unexpected twist in a story that had been built up as being a "take that" to a woman who'd somehow managed to predict things correctly after all, no matter how strange it seemed. Neither of them wanted to bring up what this change in plans meant for that situation, even though it greatly overshadowed the excitement currently residing in both of their hearts at the development. For having spent so much time being so certain that there was no way the old woman was able to be right about anything anymore, it was hard for Gundham to see what they'd just learned as a positive, despite the initial push to have children being his idea in the first place.

On the other hand, based on how she was beaming even though she hadn't stopped crying since she'd seen the first tiny movement, let alone the second one next to it, it was clear that Sonia was seeing things much more positively. She wasn't saying anything, any time her mouth opened to speak she'd start choking out sobs and fanning her smiling face to try and calm herself, and because she wasn't talking neither was her husband. That allowed for him to sit and stew in the disappointment that the fortune teller was, somehow, right about things, and for her to try and collect herself but never quite manage to do so, even as they were getting closer to the shop where she technically had half a day's work to get through.

It was an immediately bad impression to make when she got out of the car with her face covered in tears even though she was smiling, without saying a word to the man dropping her off and leaving. If it had just been Kazuichi there to watch this happen, he would have been placated with just a reminder that their relationship was none of his business; however, who else was standing there at his side but Miu, her face twisting into a smirk as she watched the scene unfold in front of her. She didn't hold herself back on nearly chasing Sonia to the door, catching her before she unlocked the shop to let herself in. "What do you think you're doing, sneaking off when customers want to buy your overpriced goods?" she asked, making Sonia jump in surprise at the sound of her voice and lose all sense of her happiness when she saw who it was that was talking to her. "That's right, I know that you and loverboy were off getting frisky during business hours, now tell me _all_ about it and I'll get off your back."

"I was doing no such thing," Sonia replied, after taking a moment to steady her voice from all of her crying. "There was an important matter we had to take care of and now I am here to sell things to people who are not you, Miu."

"Aw, you remember my name, how adorable." Miu brought a hand to Sonia's cheek, thumbing away some of her tears and paying no attention to how unamused the person she was touching seemed to be at the contact. "There's no need to lie to me, it's not like I know any of your friends other than ol' Soda out there, and even then, I don't think that fuckboy actually counts as a friend, does he?" She cackled for a moment, her laugh turning into a loud gasp as Sonia finally smacked her hand away from her face. "O-oh, you're feeling feisty now? How cute, you want to tell me how much I suck?"

"I would love to, but stress is bad for us right now and you are stressing me out." It was an innocent sentence, and Sonia thought nothing of it, but it was enough to get Miu to go wide-eyed and give her a once-over, before the cackling laugh resumed. "Just…what is so funny? I was not telling a joke, I meant what I said!"

"I'll believe it when I see it, string bean. You can't be throwing around 'us' when you're just about as big around as a below-average dick." Collecting herself to not seem like she was laughing too much in the other woman's face, Miu faked wiping her brow and stood up tall, shimmying a bit to bounce her chest just because she could. "So go on, tell me that you're just a pansy who doesn't want to banter with me and I'll be on my way, I promise."

Inhaling deeply as she prepared herself for what she was about to say, Sonia briefly considered giving Miu what she wanted and leaving it at that, but she'd managed to unlock the door and knew she could get inside and relock it if she moved fast enough in the wake of her words. "I am not a pansy, but you are certainly an ignorant woman if you think that a woman would immediately begin looking like she is with child early on. Thank you, goodbye, please leave me alone!" All of it was said so quickly, complete with her opening the door, closing it, and locking it with her on the other side, that Miu didn't even have time to properly process what she'd heard.

That didn't stop her from turning and telling Kazuichi what she thought she'd been told, and while Sonia was thankful she didn't see Miu's face there at the door again that day, she did have to deal with the person she shared the space at the shop with coming over and asking her to explain herself. Of all the people to be first to find out that she and Gundham were having a child (not even that there were two, just that they were having one), Miu and Kazuichi were the bottom of the desired list; however, there was no guarantee that they'd ever have to encounter the first person again, so it was really Kazuichi that was the problem. He was in disbelief when he heard the news, repeating over and over that they couldn't be doing that because he didn't want them to be, but Sonia made him promise that what he heard stayed between them and got to no one else's ears until she was ready.

Naturally, Kazuichi told as many people as he could before she'd even left for the evening, and that night she and Gundham were having to answer to the calls of everyone that had ever cared about them asking if the news was true. "How did the entirety of our former class hear about this in such a short amount of time?" he questioned, not asking Sonia for details but rather asking himself. "Certainly it wasn't the doctor we spoke with, there are rules against giving out information, but if not her, then who?"

Instead of coming clean about what had happened, Sonia decided that she'd just keep her mouth shut and instead think of how it had saved them the need to tell everyone themselves, as fun as that would have been. Ever since they'd found out that she was pregnant, she'd been imagining things going in a specific way, them announcing the news to everyone in some dramatic fashion financed by her parents and letting their friends shower them in gifts and love until there was no more to be given. But this way worked too, she felt, especially since it was showing them who cared and who they didn't need to keep in the loop about any specific details. "Whoever did it," she said, "has saved us a large chunk of effort in getting this out to everyone else, although now we have to figure out how to tell them all about the rest of the situation."

"There will be time for that later, right now I want to know how this got out to the world as quickly as it did! Perhaps another overlord of sorts is running rampant, hellbent on setting destruction to my life?" The answer that Gundham was looking for was quite literally right in front of his face, yet he didn't suspect that she was the one responsible for the leaking of their own big news. For the rest of the night, and for the many nights that followed, he would field calls from people looking to confirm what they'd heard from one of their friends, while wondering out loud where the information had started coming from.

Never once did Sonia even think about telling him that she'd accidentally told the person who'd told Kazuichi and let him tell everyone else, and as he slowly got over the anticlimactic reveal she was able to start pushing Gundham to think about how they were going to let everyone know that there was a huge part two to what they'd already heard. It ended up being something that they enlisted Mahiru into helping them with, as her skill with photography was undeniable and using her images to illustrate what was going on seemed to be most fitting.

That meant that she got to be the first person outside of them to learn that there were to be two new Tanakas making their way into the world towards the end of the year, and when she heard that she nearly dropped her camera in shock. "Hold on, Hiyoko told me that there was only one and that she had that confirmed by you two, are you saying you straight-up lied to her about that?" The two heads shaking at her question made Mahiru more confused, but as she saw the gentle movements between the couple, how Gundham was pulling Sonia in closer to his body, how Sonia's hands were interlaced and being held in front of her protectively as she leaned in to his shoulder, she figured that they hadn't told anyone that aspect to keep it more private. "So…what's the plan for this, then? You want to just blow that secret up for everyone to see? I don't have all day to do this, I've got an appointment later with a newborn that I don't want to miss."

"We will do our best to keep this brief then," Gundham replied, his grip on Sonia tightening as he could feel her start to bounce in excitement at the mention of someone else's baby. "What we were thinking was to do something to announce the pending addition of two children into our family, in some kind of dramatic fashion. The Devas, naturally, must be involved, but whatever else, that will be up to you."

"It needs to be cute!" Sonia chimed in, her face alight with a grin. "Simply the cutest for the darling children that are being announced with it!" It was obvious that they were both on board for the whole picture thing, even though they were both showing it in their own way, and after a couple minutes of thinking about what to do, Mahiru had a rough plan that she shared with them. There wasn't much time for setup or clothing changes, but neither of them felt like there needed to be any of that for what they were trying to do, and with minimal effort on their parts Mahiru managed to take a few pictures that were nearly ready to be shared with the world right away, but because she had something else to attend that evening she couldn't give them until the following day.

That night was spent wondering what the general reception to what they were about to share was going to be, and they fell asleep cuddled together mid-conversation, both of them wrapped around the other in the center of their bed. When morning came there was no news about when they'd be getting their pictures back, and as the day drifted into afternoon there was still no word from Mahiru about anything. She showed up at their front door late in the day, holding a couple prints in her hand and looking like she hadn't slept a wink since before they'd last seen her. "Sorry, I got really into going through all of my pictures from both shoots yesterday," she explained, handing over the small stack of pictures she'd brought. "I did some editing on them to make them their best, and if you don't like them, deal with it. This isn't costing you anything except letting me use your names on my advertising, the least you can do is appreciate my work."

Why she'd gotten so snappish about them needing to appreciate things made sense when they saw the pictures themselves, the photography stunning as always but the editing clearly done while half-awake. They'd talked to her beforehand about adding in some props that they hadn't had with them physically, and she'd done just that, but they were very clearly last-minute additions and not as seamless as they could have been. "They're lovely, thank you," Gundham said after looking at all of the pictures, his eyes welling up with the tiniest of tears at the gesture. Sure, they could have been better, but given what they were for, they were perfect. "You are going to let us share these with our friends as we wish, right?"

"That's what everyone else does with the pictures I take of them, don't see why you wouldn't." Giving a yawn, Mahiru looked dazed for a second before she shook her head, her eyes floating between both of the people she was there to see. "I hope that you're not going to just let me have this moment and then find someone else to get pictures again in the future. I do everything from maternity shoots to newborns and whatever you can think of in between, just call me and I'll be there for you."

"And for no cost but the use of our names and my lineage?" Sonia asked, to which Mahiru nodded. "That seems to be a generous offer on your part, thank you so much for being so kind. Of course, we will not let you go without pay for any of this, but…" She paused, trying to think of what she could say now that she'd started talking about payment without any actual idea of what she was going to pay. "How about you come by for dinner sometime? I think that would be better for discussion than what we are doing right now."

Mahiru blinked a few times as she made sure she'd just heard the offer of a dinner correct, before she shrugged. "Guess it's not the worst thing someone's tried to pay me with. I'll let you know what nights I've got available and we can make something happen."

They had expected to get only the pictures out of the exchange, so to have the promise of a new face around for at least one future meal was a bonus. That day was spent arranging the pictures in a way that was going to be appealing to everyone who saw them, complete with sending images of the arrangement out without hesitation; that night was then spent fielding the calls screaming at them in excitement about the news of there being two children rather than the one everyone already heard about. Some people took that news worse than others, but for every person hesitant to be happy about the news, there were three or four beyond thrilled with what they learned.

However, now that the big reveal was done, there was one interaction each of them was dreading having to see happen: Sonia was worried about what was going to take place the next time she went to her shop and had to talk to Kazuichi, and Gundham was _not_ looking forward to having to eat his words when it came to the fortune teller.

* * *

As it turned out, neither of those predicted interactions went as badly as they were fearing they would. Possibly due to the fact that he was already bummed that the girl of his dreams was having one child with someone that wasn't him, Kazuichi didn't seem to be too upset about finding out that there was going to be a second one. In fact, he seemed to be more okay with it, offering up his hands for help if they found they'd need them—and Sonia reacted to that by telling him that his presence around her children would not be needed, and that their relationship would remain merely a professional one. That was a bit of a blow to him, but he wasn't willing to test her boundaries and cause her or her children any harm.

The second interaction was the one that needed more setting up, as the challenge that had been made at the start was to visit the woman exactly three years after her prediction had been cast to prove her wrong, and while they remembered when that date would be, getting there was a bit difficult given that they both had jobs and a busy social life. Somehow they managed to be able to get away for a few days, returning to the seaside town where their journey had been pushed into beginning, and while there was no carnival on the beach this time there certainly was a town to walk through. Sonia knew exactly where the little shop had been located, on the street with so many other places she wanted to visit again, but when they got to the front door they found it locked, the building empty and seemingly abandoned. "Perfect, the fates have decided we don't need to tell her she was right after all," Gundham declared, pulling on the locked door to check it. "Let's go find somewhere else to spend time, there's no need to be here now."

"Not so fast," the old woman's voice echoed, her speaking from a bench across the street as she'd felt their energies walk up to her old haunt so confidently. Slowly she rose to standing, and without checking to see if any traffic was present she crossed to meet them, her arms held out in front of her as if she was reaching for them, but just as they got within her grasp she let both arms drop suddenly to her sides. "I sense that the dark auras between you two have only strengthened, merging into…hm, is that two smaller entities I feel? What was it that I said, two joys full of new beginnings? Was I proven right after all?"

Even though her eyes were pressed closed, the woman was facing Gundham with her wrinkled face forming a smirk at him, knowing that he'd been the one to challenge her word in the first place. "It seems you may have been correct about all of that," he conceded, knowing that fighting with her was pointless, especially since they were there to tell her she'd been right. "However, the last part of your prediction remains unproven, and I highly doubt that you managed to get that right as well."

She laughed, more in line with a witch's cackle than the gentle laughter of an older woman, and she raised a single hand, holding it towards Sonia and gesturing for her to take it in her own. Once their hands were together, the woman let out a low hum for a second before her eyes jolted open, showing her glossy, sightless pupils in dull irises. "I assure you that I can predict the order of these children, my sweet princess," the woman said, her grip on Sonia's hand tightening with every word. "My original statement remains true, by the way. There is never a reason for me to go back on my own word. A strong feminine spirit first, a stronger masculine spirit second."

"Then we shall come visit with you again in the future, to discuss how correct you may have been about those two guesses!" Sonia told her, much to Gundham's dismay; the statement was met with an immediate and loud shout that they couldn't from the woman. "Er, why not? Do you not want to get to meet the children you led us to have?"

"That's not the problem here, but I can't put the issue into words. By late November I'll be out of this place, there's no need for you trying to find me here again." Flashing a toothless smile, the woman let go of Sonia's hand and returned her arm back to resting at her side. "I can sense that something I said is off-putting, but I don't know what it is. Surprised I could guess the season meant for these precious gifts, are you?"

"Actually, we were told that we are due to meet them in December, which would mean that you are incorrect about something." Sonia's correction came with another laugh from the woman, who waved off what she'd been told entirely.

Before she could ask her to explain that reaction, the woman turned to head back across the street, giving them one last word of her otherworldly wisdom before leaving. "Keep the numbers they've told you in mind, they'll be the same despite the change in month. Never doubt a psychic when it comes to these predictions."

"I'll doubt her until my dying breath," Gundham muttered, while Sonia's brow was furrowed as she tried understanding the cryptic message they'd been given. "But there, we held true on our word and came to tell her she was correct, now let's leave this place at once. You mentioned something about wanting to do some shopping, correct?" He glanced to see that Sonia was still thinking about what she'd just been told, her hands fidgeting in front of her face as she continued trying to make sense of what the woman had said. As much as he wanted to know what conclusion she was going to come to, standing in front of an abandoned building didn't seem like the right place to make it, and so he carefully wrapped an arm over her shoulders, pulling her closer to him to break her concentration. "I said, you wanted to do some shopping, correct?"

"Oh, yes, I did! I remember that some of the shops here had the cutest clothes for children and I want ours to be as on fleek as they can be." She gave him a small smile, one that he returned with a somewhat blush-filled expression, and arm-in-arm they walked away from the former residence of the fortune teller, neither of them noticing that the blind woman had completely disappeared from being anywhere nearby in the short time since she'd left their presence. For the rest of the day, as they went from store to store, Sonia buying everything her heart desired and Gundham letting her do as she pleased simply because he had no reason to stop her, the fact that they'd been there for something as specific as making good on a challenge stayed far from their minds.

The only time they thought about the woman and her final prediction again was after they'd headed back to the room they were renting for their stay in the town, and they got started on talking about the next appointment they had to see the babies—and, in specific, find out what they were if possible. "I hope that lovely woman was right about them," Sonia quietly said after they'd talked a bit about the specifics of what was going to happen, about how they wanted to know right away and keep that information to themselves, not letting anyone else in on that part of the news until there was no way to hide it. Despite Gundham scowling at the woman being mentioned, she continued, "She seemed so confident in what she said, and she remembered it even after three years!"

"Anyone could make a guess as simple as that one," he replied, almost growling his words. "Saying one of each is the easy way out, and I'm sure it's what would be most statistically likely. She was merely spewing hot air, we can't let her word steer any of our wishes."

"You can believe that, but I am still going to let them guide me." It was said with certainty, as if Sonia had come to the decision right then and wasn't going to change her mind on it. "She was right about our wedding, and about the incident with your arm and the tube and the knife, and about our children existing in the first place, I want to believe that she knows what we will be having, and when."

"It's still only hot air," he asserted, but there was no talking Sonia down from her new position and Gundham knew it all too well. Things were only made harder for him and his refusal to accept the woman's word when, at the appointment they went to the following week, they were shown that, whether it was through statistics, through a prediction three years in the making, or through sheer luck, they should be preparing themselves for one little girl and one little boy, both of which were probably going to be _very_ little at birth.

While that wasn't exactly the case, it was close enough to it that when the time came, all of the clothing that had been gifted to them from family, friends, and even the occasional person at the veterinary clinic were far too big for either child to wear. But that only came after months upon months of anxious preparation, time during which both of the parents realized that they were about to be in far over their heads when it came to raising two children at once. The support system they had around them, reaching halfway around the world with Sonia's family and centralized in their group of friends there at home, was dedicated to helping them however they could, no matter what weird requests were made or how silly something seemed on the surface.

Overall, the time from the day they had found out what the children were to the day they met them was rather uneventful, all things considered. Yes, there were plenty of changes that were happening right before their eyes, but those had been going on since relatively soon after they'd found out about the children in the first place. Using the size and steady, predictable growth of Sonia's stomach was one thing, but all that did was make them more anxious to get to meet the children inside of it than anything else. Every time they moved, she would chirp and try to interact with them, even with the clear barrier between them, and as their movements got stronger and were able to be felt by others she'd rope anyone around her in to feeling them as well. But that was nothing more than a minor piece of the large event unfolding in front of their very eyes, and as exciting as it was to experience it wasn't a huge deal overall.

As the end of the year drew closer, with it came the somewhat urgent sense that these big things were finally going to be happening, but by the time that feeling had enveloped them they'd been aided so much with preparations that they were basically ready to greet whatever was waiting for them with open arms. Their calendars were marked, each and every one with the twenty-first day of December circled and highlighted and shown as being the predicted day that everything was going to change. Even though things seemed like they were quite uneventful, there was still a lot that had to be done before they got to that special day, and it was beginning to get to be too much for the one of them that could do things.

Thanks to the help of some of their excited friends, everything they had was set up and ready to go there at the house, which did include two rooms completely prepared for babies who wouldn't be using them for a while (one of the rooms had been the one dedicated to the Devas, and convincing Gundham that one of his actual human children deserved the space more than his four furry ones had been somewhat difficult, but Sonia and several others were able to make it happen). But because of this outpouring of love and support, what should have been the last month of waiting would have been spent doing nothing except idly sitting around restlessly, while letting the children grow inside their mother to ready themselves for their debut.

However, it ended up being a lucky break that so many people cared so much about those two little beings, because when they decided they were ready to be born, it was a quick, almost surprise process that came so far enough in advance of when the parents had been told to expect them that it almost seemed like a joke at first. In fact, if it hadn't been for how insistent Sonia was that what she began feeling that afternoon _wasn't_ her two precious little babies playing rough with each other and that she _wasn't_ being overdramatic, it would have been rather likely that she would have birthed at least one, most likely both, of them there at the house, in an unsafe setting for the occasion.

Exactly as predicted, it was the daughter who came into the world first, her lungs clearly strong despite being almost exactly a month early, in the evening hours of the twenty-second of November; a dozen minutes later her cries were dwarfed by those of her brother, much more vocal in his entrance even though he was slightly smaller than she was. Both of them were in perfectly good health, the only concerns coming from the fact that their births were considered premature, and after being cleaned up and presented to their parents the bonding was allowed to begin, under strict supervision by a team of nurses who only wanted the best for the children.

Naturally that meant that the second he was allowed to hold them, Gundham was putting one in each hand, them fitting comfortably in his grasp without being too big, or without leaving too much of his hands visible. "They aren't as small as the Devas," he remarked, admiring them both with a sense of pride that he'd never felt before, seeing their tiny faces peacefully sleeping even as he was holding them obnoxiously. "But that is fine, I shouldn't expect them to be so small. Someday they both will hold Devas of their own, carrying on the legacy of the Tanaka empire as they should!"

"Keep your voice down, I do not think they appreciate hearing you get so loud," Sonia chided in response, her own eyes squinting shut at the volume he was speaking at. She had been through a whirlwind of a day, going from a boring and typical morning to an afternoon and evening filled with some of the worst experiences she'd ever had, and now they were into the late night, getting to spend a bit of time with the children they'd been waiting to meet for months. Her exhaustion was obvious when she nearly fell asleep just because she'd closed her eyes, but the moment one of the kids began mewling out cries she was back to wide awake, her motherly instinct having kicked in from the moment she'd first heard the little girl's screeches of life.

Their time with the children wasn't long that night, as they needed to be taken to the nursery right down the hall, but for the entire time they were gone (it was only a couple hours, but it dragged on for eternity) both parents couldn't use the peacefulness of not having the extra bodies to get the last bit of sleep they'd have for the foreseeable future. They stayed awake until the children were back, talking about how their lives had changed and how exciting the new adventure they were on was going to be—but most importantly, now that they had properly met the two heirs to their somewhat convoluted bloodline, they had to name them.

And name them they did, giving them only the names that the things most precious in their lives had deserved from the moment they'd seen them there in grayscale, months before. Acknowledging one as beautiful, and one as the second child, but both precious nonetheless, they were given the matching names Naomi and Naoji, and with that decision the customized, personalized gifts from their friends could begin. Dreams of dressing them in labeled clothing, so that people could tell that she was Naomi and that he was Naoji without needing to undress them began to unfold in their minds, the decision to let them decide how they presented themselves as they aged having already been made. But before they got to that point, they'd first have to let said friends meet the children, and that was going to be an experience that would take the two being a bit older, a bit bigger, and a bit cuter to make it worth it to everyone.

Every day was a new experience for that family from then on, having to learn how to handle the children as well as their own lack of alone time, or time to sleep, or time to much more than the bare minimum of keeping up appearances. The first time someone came to visit them at home, when the twins were a couple of weeks old (even though they were deemed healthy they still ended up being kept at the hospital for just over a week, for observation and to make absolute sure that they had developed as much as they'd needed to), it was a blessing as it gave both parents the chance to become more human for a little while, pushing their bundles of happiness onto someone else. Since that someone else happened to be someone finishing up her studies to become a full-fledged doctor that _could_ handle children, it wasn't too nerve-wracking to leave her in charge of them, but the sleep that they got while Mikan was around felt cheap, undeserved, and like they were missing something while they got it.

She came around as often as she could, but with her residency at the same hospital where the two had been born eating up most of her time, that wasn't often at all. Mahiru stopped by several times as well, bringing her camera with her every time she did so she could get both candid and posed pictures of the babies, all of which she insisted she was doing because she could use them in advertising, but it was likely she kept coming back because they were slipping her money each time before she left. Other friends showed up now and then, but the notable absence was Kazuichi, who'd taken what he'd been told about never showing up unannounced and to cause trouble to heart and hadn't once come by since the incident with the knife in the cage.

Even with how crazy life had become now that there were two tiny people who needed all the love and support in the world, both Sonia and Gundham had to admit that something seemed to be missing, and while it may have been a decision made by their completely-exhausted minds, they both concluded that it wasn't exactly fair to exclude Kazuichi from the lives of the children. That was a decision they immediately regretted making, after dressing the babies up in the cutest, warmest clothes they could and taking them over to the mechanic shop before they headed to one of their check-up appointments. It was strange seeing the shop without the brightly-lit clothing store in its lobby, but the days of having the time to run that were long over, the memory of it a relic of a past that wasn't going to be returned to.

Kazuichi met them outside, rubbing his hands on his completely grease-stained jumpsuit when he saw the couple in the front of their car. As they got out he kept his distance, but the moment one of the two little babies, squirming and making high-pitched whines, was removed from the back seat of the vehicle he came closer, wanting to see what was going on for himself. "I guess I must've thought you'd have kept 'em from me forever," he said, as the second child came into view, him gravitating towards it solely because Sonia was the one holding them. "This is pretty sweet, though, even if they're that jerk's kids. What's this one's name, huh? They're kinda cute, just like their mom."

"Aw, your flattery does not work in such close conjunction with rudeness," Sonia quickly replied, hoping that at least she'd get an apology out of him for what he'd said. When all that happened was him reaching for the child, she jerked away, pulling the baby closer into her, and further away from him. "I did not give you permission to touch him, please keep your unwashed hands off of my delicate child! He is not strong enough to brush off whatever germs you may place on him."

"Actin' like I'd kill him or something with just a little touch, what do you take me for? I just wanna get to shake his hand, get to know him a bit." Kazuichi paused as he looked over at the other child present, the one whose face he couldn't see due to how Gundham was holding her. "And that one too, except I'm startin' to think you just brought 'em here to say you gave me the chance to see them, you're not really gonna let me know them, are ya?"  
"They're babies, what do you expect to gain from this?" Raising an eyebrow at the behavior he was watching, Gundham didn't think he'd see Kazuichi flinch at the question, going back to staring exclusively at the child in Sonia's arms. "I am beginning to think this was a mistake, Sonia. It's beyond obvious that Kazuichi believed that these children would be introduced to him at a point where they could withstand his meddling. They may have darkness running in their veins, but that does not make them superhuman at such young ages. Perhaps we should take our leave now."

"Oh, that makes sense." Bouncing her son very gently to readjust how he was being held, Sonia watched as Kazuichi tried to reach towards him again, and that became the final straw for their time there. As quickly as they'd shown up they were leaving, even with Kazuichi begging them to stay, that he wanted to at least learn the kids' names before they left.

He wasn't even given that much, and the only reason he learned what they were months later was because of a mutual friend of theirs talking about the precious Tanaka twins with him while they were at his shop. He did get to see them from time to time as they grew up, but by the time he properly got to meet the pair they were already much older than he thought possible, walking and running and screaming after each other in words only they understood; from there he was given little glimpses into their lives but never more than a few minutes of their time.

It was honestly a miracle that the two grew up to be as relatively normal as they were, given that neither of their parents could be classified as such. For the first few years of their lives, as they were growing and learning how to become tiny people, they stayed the same as each other, always copying whatever the other learned so that the only real difference in the two were small personality differences; the biggest one was that it was hard to ever find Naoji without a cheesy smile on his face, whereas it took Naomi a lot of effort to even crack a small smile at anyone. That changed as they grew, as she found it within herself to find joy in the things around her, while he slowly fell into the so-called pit of darkness and allowed himself to really begin buying into his father's every dramatic word.

By the time they were five years old, they had begun showing what were undeniably personal interests, something that made their parents proud to see. Naomi would spend as much time as she could outside (with someone, typically Sonia, supervising what she was doing), playing in the dirt and burying seeds she found to see what would grow from them. She didn't understand that most of the things she was planting were never going to grow in a residential front yard, but the thrill of trying to grow things was what mattered to her. Her brother, on the other hand, enjoyed staying inside playing with the Devas, all of which had been replaced at least once in his short life already but he didn't notice. Naoji was careful enough with the little hamsters, but he loved styling their fur and attempting to decorate them with markers, something he wasn't ever allowed to do.

Whenever there were guests at the house, the twins would take to trying to impress them however they could, wearing their long hair the same way and removing any identifying marks from their clothing so that whoever they were talking to had to know their particular quirks to know which one was there. If the child was talking about plants and nature, it had to be Naomi that was there, and if they were going on about making things look nice even though they were filled with darkness, that was definitely Naoji. Sometimes people would comment on how the children were being raised so similarly, even though they didn't need to be, but the truth was that the kids had always been intended to choose their own path in life and they hadn't quite made it to the point where they wanted to be completely different from the person they were closest to in life.

It was clear that there would someday be a divide between them, though, and it was apparent when the two would be talking to each other. As the one more aligned with their parents' interests, Naoji found it easy to start acting like he was a miniature version of their father, going on about how he had the trust of the Four Dark Devas of—usually he'd say "Des-duck-tion" but he could occasionally bellow out Destruction and make his sister, already aware of the hamminess of that claim, roll her eyes and cover her ears. "They're just…mouses," Naomi would reply, not even aware she had the wrong rodent down for the creatures. "They don't do special stuff."

"Seeds don't do special stuff too!" he'd retort, shoving his face into hers to try intimidating her, and from there they'd devolve into hair-grabbing and fighting, always breaking apart before they'd get caught in their scuffle. For looking so similar, it was clear that they were nowhere near the same person, and those differences would only become more prominent as they grew older and more attuned to their interests.

Even still, they would always be their parents' precious babies, strong little individuals that they were honored to get to raise. They may not have been the perfect blends of their parents that people expected them to be (neither had a real interest in being technical royalty, nor did they care about animals in the exact way their father did), but they were the exact additions that the family needed. Additions that, no matter how much Sonia would repeat that they were gifts from a fortune teller who knew the future better than anyone, Gundham insisted were brought to them because of his status as the Supreme Overlord of Ice. After all, he insisted, only someone with as much power as him, married to someone as royal as her, could end up with two bright, brilliant children who'd someday change the world with their love of beautiful things.

* * *

**A/N: okay so I _could_ have probably written so much more for this, but numbers matter a lot to me and this fic, as I wrote it, is exactly 22,222 words long, with 11,111 words in each part. why's that? well, because...okay why that is is actually really obvious.**

**anyway I love these fankids and I wanted to flesh out their backstories a bit so here we are c:**


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